Amy Marshall’s recent performance “Tides of Change”, commissioned by the Macau Cultural Centre Sevem months after the launch of the “Dance to New York– Choreographer Exchange Programme” created by the Macau Cultural Centre, the Amy Marshall Dance Company (AMDC) and local choreographers Candy Kuok and Stella Ho energetically presented the fruit of their labours on the 18th of October in Macau.
On its world premiere evening, the performance “Tides of Change” was greeted by the local audience with overwhelming enthusiasm. Despite critiques of Amy Marshall’s provocative style of overt sentimentalism and her abundant usage of tiresome body movements, one has to admit that the whole project ended in a remarkable success in terms of local acceptance and involvement. Groups of local students and friends who met the troupe during school tour workshops waited at the backstage door as if the AMDC were visiting rock stars. Unrestrained cheers and applause were showered on them. In retrospect, the generous response of our notoriously “passive” Macau audience is worthy of our attention and thoughts. A small troupe of just nine dancers, including lead choreographer Amy Marshall, the New York-based AMDC enjoys a fame centred on its technical ability, often expressed in terms of powerful physical movements. Local choreographers Stella Ho and Candy Kuok both commented on their impressions of the company’s “efficiency” and “skill”, observed during their visit to New York. “Personally, I tend to learn from many different styles and skills,” Candy Kuok says. “In contrast, I realised that the AMDC dancers would rather spend their time focusing on the development of their own style. Though they might seem not to know very much about what other troupes are doing, they certainly know what they themselves are getting at. The concentration is amazing. This has led them to be experts at what they do.” During the three-week workshop in New York with the AMDC, Candy and Stella participated in a series of intensive training and brainstorming sessions. “For me, the experience was certainly new,” Stella ho says. “As my background is based exclusively on Chinese dance, the training sessions in yoga and modern dance gave me a chance to reconsider my previous approach, and my view of Chinese dance was further developed thanks to the distance I experienced.” The influence was certainly not one-sided. as was observed in the performance of “Tides of Change”, a lot of Chinese dance elements were incorporated into Amy Marshall’s choreography. Nevertheless, during this encounter some adjustment was inevitable. Candy Kuok recounts her own experience: “Since we were invited also to contribute ideas for the creation of ‘Tides of Change’, I was very excited and wrote lots of proposals concerning the choreography, even before I arrived in New York. I soon realised, though, that amy had a very precise idea of just how we were going to contribute, and she did not hesitate to claim her responsibility as the lone choreographer of the piece. I adjusted to the idea but kept sharing my suggestions as soon as I had any. Then, once, during a brainstorming session in New York, while I was improvising a movement, Amy saw it and suddenly cried out to me. ‘That’s it!’ she said. We finally understood that it was through physical encounter and expressions that we could really exchange our ideas in the practice of dance.”In this way, Amy Marshall gathered together all the ideas and created “Tides of Change”, which is based on the three choreographers’ memories, their current lives and the way their imagination revolves around the city of macau. Once back in Macau, Candy and Stella anxiously awaited the the troupe’s visit to the city.
Three weeks before the performance, the AMDC finally arrived and was fully geared. They conducted a series of educational workshop sessions in various local schools and rehearsed “Tides of Change” in the evenings. Training sessions were again necessary, as more local dancers were auditioned and cast in the show. New encounters with local citizens and the cityscape of macau were the background of the activities. While everything was working towards the final goal, the energy of the troupe grew towards a climax, which took place on the evening of the performance. The project “Tides of Change”, commissioned by the Macau Cultural Centre, was a successful venture in a definite sense. The confrontation of Macau’s artists and audience with the extraordinary energy of the AMDC is sure to leave a lasting impression. as Macau’s social atmosphere is being doomed to materialistic boredom, such dynamic energy was perceived as fresh water in a thirsty mouth. Local choreographers Candy Kuok and Stella Ho have shown, before an audience, their ability not only to adapt such energy, but also to exalt their previous achievements. Now we can actually hope that this kind of “tide” will continue to come in and wash over our artists and audience, because in a time of critical change, Macau has no reason to stay passive and wait.
Macau Closer Magazine, 2008 November issue @ page116 / page59 digital version
by Alice Kok
